Overdiagnosed but Underserved.

“As a non-binary trans person [..] I could not receive treatment in a GIU (Gender Identity Unit) because I felt forced to lie and pretend to be a binary trans man, and this in my case would be unfeasible because what I’m doing is a low hormone treatment dose to reach only a certain level of changes and when changes have taken place I will lower the dose. Conventional professionals would most likely not respect this type of process and pressure me to accept a binary transition pack or to remain without treatment.”Non-binary person, age 34, Spain

Together, our goal was to provide a deeper understanding of the healthcare situation of trans people in Europe. To gain this understanding we conducted the survey in five countries; Georgia, Poland, Serbia, Spain, and Sweden.

The Surveys

“I’ve been going to doctors in (…) trying to get permission for sex change, but I have a feeling that they are not too interested to help me – they don’t provide me with adequate psychological support, actually they still misgender me, and every session comes down to them attempting to give me medication against depression and anxiety, though I’ve been telling them that the cause of those problems is basically unavailability of the treatment I’ve been waiting for.”Trans man, age 22, Serbia

This is the first research on trans healthcare in which both trans healthcare users and healthcare providers have been questioned about the provision of general healthcare to trans people in the country they live and work in.

After a period of data gathering in 2016 we had results from 885 healthcare users, and 888 healthcare providers.

The Results

“The healthcare from psychologists in the Gender Identity Treatment Unit was not only unhelpful, it was also humiliating and degrading. There is inadequate information about treatments and surgeries, and authoritarian, paternalistic and pathological attitudes abound.”Trans woman, age 22, Spain

Authors:

Reference:

If you want to reference this work, please use the following citation:Transgender Europe, Overdiagnosed but Underserved, 2017

On Social Media:

Use the hashtags #transhealthcare #transhealth to reference the project on Twitter. If you would like to use some of these images; just right-click to save them.

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